1990 - Season 2 (1978)

"Authorised Systematic Harassment has enormous potential. The slow and noiseless steamroller of the State. The daily brown envelope dropping on the mat". The Public Control Department, in response to more dissident remarks printed in the underground press from Kyle and Tony Doran, devise a plan to turn the heat up on the pair by employing a systematic campaign of Authorised Systematic Harrassment (ASH). Using all the bureaucratic mechanisms at his disposal, Skardon launches a tirade of officialdom against both men, which succeeds in pushing Doran and his wife to ...

"If Kyle can uncover those extortionists where an expert PCD man failed, he is obviously implicated with them." When workers fall prey to an extortionist network collecting money in exchange for their continued silence, Kyle's involvement attracts the attention of PCD controller Skardon, who recognizes an opportunity to eliminate the network and the thorn in his side in one stroke.

"The authorities have refused me an exit visa for the Chess Championship because they fear I might not come back." Having lost his job as the home affairs correspondent at The Star, Kyle is reduced to covering the European Chess Championship. While there, he meets the chess prodigy Philip Ross, an old friend from the early protests against the dictatorship who has turned into a PCD hack. His victories have resulted in him being hailed as a national hero, becoming known as one of Skardon's Lions. In the meantime, three dissidents plot to take Lynn hostage but Kyle ...

"Kyle'll be back to normal in about an hour. Until then he'll probably show an amusing tendency to tell the truth." Groups of dissidents, once-divided in their opposition to the Public Control Department, are putting aside their differences in a bid to bring down the bureaucratic machine in a consolidated movement. Meanwhile, Skardon increases his pursuit of Kyle, whom he believes he can break and thereby shatter the plans of the opposition.

"We always said there'd be Peace Crimes Trials one day ... We're winning now. There'll have to be a purge of the PCD soon." The dissident assault on the Public Control Department has been successful, but the public suicide of a cell member has resulted in world condemnation of Britain's policies and the PCD being plunged into bitter in-fighting. Have Kyle and the dissidents finally won? Will Skardon and the PCD fall for good, and if they do will the cure prove worse than the disease?